
The Quest 
of the Aoes 



DEAN 




Class. 
Book. 






'T)^- 



Copyright }^°_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



The Quest 

of the Ages 

OR 

A Search for the 
Poles of Truth 

By 
OLIN SANDEFORD DEAN 

"Weaverville College, Weaverville, N. C. 




Cochrane Publishing Company 
Tribune Building 
New York 
1910 






Copyright, 1910, by 
Cochrane Publishing Co. 



;CLA273414 






\ 

DEDICATED 
To her in whom the author has dicovered the near- 
est approach to perfect sincerity that he has ever 
known in a human life — his loving and devoted wife. 



FOREWORD 

The title originally intended for this little 
volume, "A Search for the Poles/' was aban- 
doned because of the probability of its being 
somewhat misleading. The book is the out- 
growth of an address delivered before the 
Young Men's Christian Ajssociation, Char- 
lotte, N. C, and its purpose is to inspire the 
reader with a deeper love for the Truth. It 
goes out from the heart and hand of the author 
as a message of love to his fellow men. May 
it awaken, uplift and inspire mjany! 

O. S. D. 
Weaverville, N. C, 

May 24, 1910. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

I 

Human Achievements and Ideals ... 7 

II 

The Pursuit of Truth 14 

III 
Jesus and the Truth 22 

IV 
The Poles Found 29 



The Quest of the Ages 
I. 

Human Achievements and Ideals 



The bravest trophy ever man obtained, 
Is that which o'er himself, himself hath gain'd. 

— Earl of Sterling. 



When we contemiplate human attainment 
from tlie point of view of its extent and bril- 
liancy, we are beguiled into immoderate ad- 
miration; but when we compare this attain- 
ment with the infinite unattained, we discover 
that its lustre is little more than a glamor 
and its magnitude a disappointing shadow. 
Men look with pride upon their boasted 
heights of power, but their achievements 
dwindle into distressing smallness when 
placed beside the pyramids of God's majestic 
creation. 

The explorers have sought earnestly for the 
poles of the earth, and some of them have 



8 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

astonished the world with their idaring, perse- 
verance and success; but when they have en- 
dured hunger and hardship, and have pene- 
trated the icy fields, and have trod w^here even 
polar bears mjight fear to go ; when they have 
experienced the exquisite pleasure of attain- 
ing the object of their desire and have become 
the recipients of the flattery of men, still, even 
then, there remains, as only a small part of the 
great unknown, the lone pole star, far out in 
the distant over-hanging blue, the pivot of 
twinkling processions, itself a wanderer and 
practically a stranger to earth's wisest ken and 
but meargerly comprehended by limited mortal 
knowledge. 

Thomas Edison has spent a lifetime wooing 
into his possession the secrets of electrical 
power; but, after all, he has done little more 
than tap a few of the myriad currents that flow 
through this realm of mystery. So wonderful 
was the progress of the nineteenth century one 
might be tempted to conclude that there is 
little else to invent and nothing more to dis- 
cover; but we have only entered the ante-cham- 
ber of the universe of knowledge. We are in 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 9 

the first of the book, and, as we turn its pages, 
there will greet us, year after year, century 
after centurj^, an ever-increasing abundance 
and variety, told in the diction of the Master- 
Writer of the ages and revealing the rich 
treasures of His infinite love. 

Great as have been the achievements of the 
past, we have but begun to achieve. In all 
periods of the world's history there have been 
those who have loved and sought the truth ; but 
their highest conceptions of it have been far 
from! its fulness and reality. The influences 
that develop character have produced a vast 
variety of conceptions of life ; the processes of 
civilization have evolved many and conflicting 
standards of belief and conduct; but not one of 
earth's deepest thinkers or most ardent lovers 
of truth has grasped it in its fulness or meas- 
ured up to God's ideal of symmetry and beauty. 

Sin has for a time seemed to spoil the orig- 
inal plan of God and has deflected thie Creator's 
princely product — p^ian — from his normal and 
intended course ; so that the history^ of the race 
is but a record of man's limping quest for that 
which he lost in the long ago. The all-wise 



10 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

Father is permitting a pilgrimage, as it were, 
in a strange land, where His children, having 
wandered from the narrow Way, may through 
vicissitude, through sorrow and searching and 
toil, work out an experience that shall fit them 
for the vaster and grander experience of the 
truth when they shall come into the knowledge 
of it in the Fatiher's own appointed time. Thus, 
in seeking to attain the summnjim honum of life 
as each one has represented it to himself, men 
have formed conceptions and established 
standards according to the forces that have 
operatd within their lives and those that have 
been brought to bear upon them from without. 
One's conception of life has much to do with 
his character in this world and with his destiny 
in any other. It has often been said that there 
is no pleasure in certain amusements indulged 
in chiefly by young people; but, as a matter of 
fact, there is real enjoyment in these things 
for those who engage in them, since they con- 
stitute their standard of pleasure. A man in 
the business world develops through the years 
a certain ideal of attainment, and in accord- 
ance therewith directs his thinking and puts 
forth his effort. The ideal may be far from the 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 11 

correct standard, but he has adopted it, and, 
therefore, seeks to realize it. Hiis character as 
a man of business and his success depend upon 
and are determiined by it. Said a man of the 
world one day: ^^If I were forbidden the in- 
dulgence of m\y passion of lust, life would cease 
to have any attraction for mje,'' That was his 
standard of enjoyment, degraded and debasing, 
indeed, but his standard just the same; and 
his character may be judged accordingly. 

Contrast with these low and ignoble ideals 
that of St. Paul: ^Tor me to live is Ohrist;'' 
and again, "I count all things to be loss for the 
excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my 
Lord !" Such was his exalted conception, and 
his experience attested the worthiness of his 
ideal. 

A fond mjother had a boy. He was her only 
child and the orphan of her loved companion. 
Her absorbing passion and purpose centered in 
the training of this boy. Her every thought 
was for him. She toiled and wept and prayed 
through more than twenty years of a compara- 
tively lonely life, in order to throw her soul 
and self into his preparation for manhood's 



12 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

responsibilities. This she believed to be a 
mother's mission. As soon as the boy finished 
his college course and became established in 
his chosen profession, her frail body, no longer 
supported by the thrill of purpose and the ex- 
ertion of will, began to fail ; and one morning, 
not long after the birth of a new year, she 
quietly slipped away. 

It is one of the tragedies of our race that a 
great many people have no clear conception of 
life at all, no fixed purpose, no definite goal. 
The masses are not given to serious meditation 
upon life and its problemts. We have frequently 
heard the expression, "the courage of his con- 
victions;" but the trouble often seemis to be 
not so much in the absence of courage as in the 
poverty of conviction. So superficial is the 
attention given by large numbers of our young 
people to matters of real import and weighty 
significance that they do not develop definite, 
clear-cut conviction, and are, as a consequence, 
wanting in great purpose and force of char- 
acter. Let every young man or young woman 
who reads these lines determine to look life 
courageously in the face, consider its problems. 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 13 

encounter its difficulties and for himself dis- 
cover and grasp its mighty and complex mean- 
ing ! Learn to think ; be not satisfied with an 
incomplete life. Get a vision ; seek a large un- 
derstanding; let your horizon be thrust away 
out! 

He who is thus awakened to a vision of 
greater and nobler things is no longer content 
to stay in the low ground, where he is sur- 
rounded by an atmosphere of ignorance and 
bound by the narrow limitations of an unat- 
taining, unachieving life. He feels the thrill 
of a strong and growing purpose and fixes his 
eye upon some great and glorious goal. He 
hears a voice calling him to worthy endeavor 
and leaps to answer the summons. His heart 
becomes receptive towards the truth ; the seed 
is sown in the fallow ground; and there is 
promise of a golden harvest. 



II. 

The Pursuit of Truth 

The wish to know — that endless thirst, 
Which ev*n by quenching is awak*d, 

And which becomes or blest or curst. 
As is the fount whereat 'tis slak'd. 

Still urged me onward, with desire 

Insatiate, to explore, inquire. 

— Moore. 

Bacon said in his famous essay on Truth, 
"Certainly it is heaven upon earth, to have a 
man's mind move in charity, rest in provi- 
dence, and turn upon the poles of truth." 
When we study this excellent saying of the 
great philosopher, we naturally desire to know 
the answer to the question with which the 
essay begins, "What is truth?" and immed- 
iately begin a search for the poles. It is less 
difficult to understand what is meant by the 
mind's moving in charity and resting in provi- 
dence than to grasp the significance of the last 
of the trio — ^the turning upon the poles of 
truth. 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 15 

Not more engaging is the ardent search for 
the poles of the earth than is that of the lover 
of truth for its charming secrets. The labors • 
of those who have endeavored to locate the re- 
spective ends of the earth's axis, as well as all 
other true adventures in the realm of science, 
are, indeed, efforts to establish some phase or 
phases of the truth. To discover action and 
reaction by means of the chemical test is but 
an example of science at work in the interest 
of truth. The history of electricity, from the 
time when Franklin submitted his kite to the 
flash of the storm to the exquisite moment that 
witnesses the latest brilliant achievement in 
this realm, is but a record of development in 
man's unrelenting quest after truth. Inven- 
tion and discovery in all the departments of 
scientific endeavor, together with the spirit of 
development and improvement that has char- 
acterized the progressive thought of the ages, 
have funished the ground, supplied the mate- 
rial and witnessed the reward of constant and 
passionate search after truth. 

Educational enterprise, philosophic research 
and literary effort have also contributed to the 



16 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

men}X)rable quest of the ages. The golden 
fleece of truth has led many an ambitious , 
Jason through the hardships and difficulties of ( 
long and arduous expeditions. The author of i 
the imtaortal "Faere Queene'' has incarnated } 
in his chaste and charming diction the beauti- 1 
ful story of the knight's devotion to the fair ( 
Una, who was the impersonation of truth, j 
More wisely than he knew or intended, per- 
haps, the distinguished author of the essays 
said: ^Truth, w^hich only doth judge itself, 
teacheth, that the inquiry of truth, which is 
the love-making or wooing of it, the knowledge 
of truth, which is the presence of it, and the 
belief of truth, which is the enjoying of it, is 
the sovereign good of human nature.'^ Plato 
peered with pathetic earnestness into the realm 
of immortal truth, and Socrates, teacher of the 
youth of Athens, had an insight into the great 
secret denied to most men who live in the 
luminous dawn of the twentieth century. 

But let us return to the question, What is 
truth? We are embarrassed by the poverty of 
definition. Truth is conformity to fact or 
reality, exact accordance with what has been, 






THE QUEST OF THE AGES 17 

is, or shall be, the dictionary tells us ; and yet 
we are not satisfied by that. Truth is the op- 
posite of falsehood, and embodies the ideas of 
honesty, sincerity, purity, virtue and upright- 
ness. It is that inestimiable quality or condi- 
tion or experience in which alone is found the 
basis of all right action and true character. 
Without a strict regard for truth in its iden- 
tity with right thinking and right conduct, it 
is impossible for one to live a worthy life. 

Yet, the extent to which insincerity prevails 
among men is startling. They are dishonest 
not only with each other but with themlselves. 
One has only to examine his own experience 
for conflrmiation of this fact. What one of us 
can say that we have always been perfectly 
consistent in thought, word and deed? Where 
is the man or woman who has not felt a deep 
sense of the painful divergence between per- 
sonal experience and the straight white line 
of truth? Placed in tlie halances, how often 
have we been found wanting? The prevalence 
of falsehood and insincerity among men is ap- 
palling; moral truth is discounted, not only in 
the cabin of the poor but in the cottage of the 



18 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

rich as well ; in the humble and high walks of 
life alike. Aind why this condition of things? 
Because men do not love the truth. 

There is a beautiful ideal, inherent within 
which are symmetry and order and purity, and 
towards which every man who becomes a true 
man must tend. A youth bows at the feet of 
her who ha;s captured his heart. She is his 
ideal, far surpassing all others, and represent- 
ing to himi all that is lovely and beautiful in 
womanhood. No pen can describe her power 
over him. He is lost in adoration, passionate 
in devotion. He thinks of her by day and 
dreamls of her by night. The sweetest and 
purest thoughts ever associate themselves in 
his mind with this fair idol of his heart; her 
defects are hidden from him; all is beauty, 
charm and love ! So ought men passionately to 
love the truth ; such power, and greater, should 
it have over their lives. 

The native element of normal man is that 
of truth, me was designed by the Creator as a 
being who should develop and grow and be- 
come the glad possessor of the infinite riches of 
the universe of God. Mind cannot conceive nor 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 19 

language describe the possibilities of the 
human soul. Had not sin done its deadly work, 
entering to mar and blast and destroy, even on 
this earth and in the ages that he has already 
found a dwelling place here, man would have 
made progress beyond) the fondest dreams of 
the human imagination or the power of humlan 
speech to express. It is the belief and the 
glorious hope of the Qhristian that he is yet to 
be redeemjed from this state of semi-darkness 
and impairment of his faculties, and not only 
restored to the blessedness of his original con- 
dition but inducted into grander experiences 
than he has ever been able to imagine or con- 
ceive. 



"Things which eye saw not, and ear heard not, 
And which entered not into the heart of man, 
Whatsoever things God prepared for them that 
love Him/' 



It is, therefore, the exalted privilege of those 
that have eyes to see and ears to hear to get the 
vision of a splendid development of their moral 
and spiritual nature, to hear the call out of the 
great Beyond and to respond to its thrilling 
notes. A boy climbed to the top of a distant 



20 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

crag, and, daring to invade an eagle's nest, got 
possession of a very young eaglet. He carried 
it as a trophy to his home in the vale below, 
where he carefully nourished it from day to 
day. The little stranger grew until he reached 
a considerable stage of development. From 
time to time it had tried its wings from fence 
to limb, but had never seemed to realize that it 
was an eagle. One day, however, there ap- 
peared high in the upper air an old eagle who 
uttered a loud cry. The little eaglet in the 
barnyard turned his head and listened. Again 
the cry came, nearer than before. The wings 
of the young eagle began to move and his keen 
eye sighted the old bird away up amdng the 
clouds. A third time the cry cam'e, as its author 
was passing on towards the distant hills. 
Filled with restless discontent, the young eagle 
rose from the ground, and, gaining confidence 
as he moved upAvard, soared to join the king 
of birds in his native atmosphere, far above 
earth's geese and barnyards, among the glory- 
crowned mountain tops. And so may you, dear 
reader, hear and answer the call to a higher 
and nobler sphere. 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 21 

The most delightful aspect in which we may 
contemplate truth, perhaps, is its relation to 
the freedom of the soul. There is no thought 
the human heart loves so much as that of free- 
dom. Men seek knowledge that they may be 
free. They desire wealth that they may enjoy 
the freedom that it can bring. The poets have 
sung of it, our fathers fought for it, and we 
daily strive for it. The growth and develop- 
ment of life tend toward it, and all knowledge 
and possessions are supposed to contribute 
to it. Holmes beautifully gathers the idea into 
his "Ohamibered Nautilus" : 

"Build thee more stately mansions, O, my soul. 

As the swift seasons roll! 

Leave thy low- vaulted past! 
Let each new temple, nobler than the last, 
^"•Ji.J."" "°™ heaven with a dome more vast 

Till thou at length art free. 
Leaving thine out-grown shell by life's unresting 

Jesus said : "Ye shall know the truth and the 
truth shall miake you free." 



III. 

Jesus and the Truth 

I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. 

— Jesus. 

A STUDY of the character of Jesus Christ 
gives one the impression of completeness and 
uniformity. Evenness of (development is not 
common among men; but in Him we see the 
well-rounded, complete life. About Him there 
is always an atmosphere of truth. In the con- 
templation of His unique personality one feels 
instinctively that he is in the presence 'of 
purity. It has never been denied that He had 
all the characteristics of a sincere, sinless and 
holy being. Of Hjim before His birth the 
angel said to His mother: ^The Holy Ghost 
shall come upon thee : therefore also that holy 
thing which shall be born of thee shall be called 
the Son of God.'' (Luke 1: 35). Isaiah, with 
prophetic vision and inspired pen, wrote of 
Him: "By His knowledge shall my righteous 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 23 

servant justify miany." (Isaiah 53: 11). The 
apostle Peter, who was intimlately associated 
with Him and was very close to the heart of 
the Lord, being one of the "inner circle'' whom 
Jesus took apart with Him in confidence on 
several occasions, writes in his first Epistle: 
"Because dhrist also suffered for us, leaving 
us an example, that ye should follow in His 
steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found 
in His mouth." ( 1 Pet. 2 : 21-22 ) . Speaking of 
our redemption through Christ, the same 
writer says : "Forasmuch as ye know that ye 
were not redeemed with corruptible things, as 
silver and gold, ♦ * ♦ but with the pre- 
cious blood of Christ, as a Lamb without blem- 
ish and without spot.'' (1 Pet. 1 : 18-19). The 
Master Himself, conscious of His own sinless- 
ness, on one occasion flung into the face of Hlis 
accusers the unanswerable question, "Which of 
you convinceth me of sin?" (John 8: 46). 

Not only was He sinless and holy; He was 
also faithful and just and true. "Faithful is 
He that callet'h you," says Paul ( 1 Thess. 5 : 
24). Amd again: "But the Lord is faithful, 
who will stablish you and keep you from evil." 



24 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

(2 Thess. 3:3.) Isaiah speaks again thus: 
"And righteousness shall be the girdle of His 
loins and faithfulness the girdle of His reins." 
(Is. 11: 15). In the first Epistle of John we 
read: "And we know that the Son of Grod is 
come, and hath given us understanding, that 
we may know Him that is true, and we are in 
Him that is true, even in His Son Jesua 
Christ.'' (1 John 5: 20). 

In the Gospel of John the writer beautifully 
says of H]im! : "And the Word was made flesh, 
and dwelt among us, * * * full of grace 
and truth.'' (John 1: 14). 

Again, Jesus illustrated in His matchless 
life the great and fundamental principle of 
obedience, being Himself always obedient to the 
Father. "My meat," said He, "is to do the 
will of Him that sent m!e." ( Jolhn 4 : 34) . 

But why give further piassages concerning 
the character of Jesus, the Man of Sorrows, the 
loving, gentle Master? We know that He was 
meek and long-suffering, compassionate and 
kind, full of self-idienial, humble, benevolent, 
forgiving. By His temptation and His tears 
we know that He was human, had we no other 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 25 

proofs. That He was Divine is an inevitable 
conclusion, growing out of the fact that He 
was what Hje was. He was more than human, 
for humanity alone is admittedly incapable of 
producing the like of Him; therefore, being 
m'ore than human. He was necessarily Divine. 
"He expressed the consciousness of possessing 
a unique knowledge of God,'' says a certain 
author, "and verified that consciousness before 
all the ages of the world by the nrntchless, and 
as yet unfathomed, truth which He revealed 
to men concerning God. He expressed the cout 
sciousness of sustaining a relation of unique 
intimacy with God, a deep, essential, organic 
relation, which is probably best expressed and 
described in His habitual self-designation, the 
Son, the Son of God.'' 

Combining thus the qualities of character 
humian and divine, far surpassing and trans- 
cending all others in the history of men, excell- 
ing all in magnanimity, in kindness and in 
love, and manifesting a strange superiority 
over the things of time and sense. He exists, 
in the universe of thought and life, a figure 
of supreme tenderness and commanding 



26 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

power. Nor is this power less real in its sway 
over the hearts of men today than when he 
walked with His disciples by the Sea of Gali- 
lee. All who come into His presence feel the 
force of His personality. He, being lifted up, 
draws men unto Himself. "The sympathy of 
Jesus,'' says one, "is the channel through which 
His power flows, and the abundance of the 
stream! testifies to the reserve power at the 
source." He is the emjbodiment of truth. Men 
are ofttimies cowards, because they are insin- 
cere, limited, impoverisihed; but He had no 
fear, for He had the consciousness of being 
Himself the source of sincerity and truth and 
of unsearchable riches of power and love. And 
He i« today — glorious, comforting thought ! — 
the fountain of living water, the "One alto- 
gether lovely,'' and "the fairest among ten 
thousand" to all who believe on His precious 
name. 

Using the words of a writer already quoted, 
His character "is able to serve the world, as an 
unstinted river flows down among the utilities 
of life because it is replenished from the 
eternal hills. It has its abundance and its re- 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 27 

serves, its stream of service and its peace in 
solitude; and the power whicii moves the busy 
wheels of the life of man is fed from the high 
places of the life of God.'' 

He said of Himself, "I ami the Way, the 
Truth, and the Life." We are brought, then, 
to the interesting proposition that Truth and 
the personality of Jesus Christ are identical. A 
study of His matchless character, therefore, 
brings us into im|mediatle contemplation of 
truth in its highest and completest form, and 
the possession of a knowledge of Jesus enables 
us to make our own that truth, the incoming of 
which giveth light, liberty and peace. This 
knowledge of Christ, therefore, in the com- 
pleteness of His unique personality, constitutes 
a knowledge of the Truth. Then, if a man's 
mind is to turn upon the poles of truth, he must 
find these poles in the person, teachings and 
character of Jesus Christ, who is the personifi- 
cation of all truth. 

The world does not know this, and Christ 
does not reign now, as He will somte day, in the 
hearts of men ; but the day of His power is com- 
ing and may not be far distant. When the elect 



28 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

purpose of God, being wrought out through 
the ages, shall have been accomplished, the en- 
thronement of Jesus in the lives of men will 
have been made complete, and we shall see all 
truth and perfection gathered in luminous 
triumph and glorious realization and miani- 
festation in the person and nam)e and power of 
Him T\^ho is the Son of God ! 



IV. 

The Poles Found 

truth divine! Enlightened by thy ray, 

1 grope and guess no more, but see my way. 

— Arbuthnot. 

The great work of Jesusi, and His transcen- 
dent icharacter as well, turn upon the poles of 
Faith and Love. His faith gave Him a sublime 
consciousness of God. The relation that He 
sustained to the Father opened to Him the 
length and breadth and depth of the Divine 
nature and brought within the sweep of 
His vision the great purposes of God. 
He was not limited by the boundaries 
of the finite, but standing upon the 
mountain top, He took in the vast range 
of the heavenly plan and saw clearly the 
limitless horizon of the Eternal. He was the 
friend, companion. Son, of Him who sat upon 
the throne, and, being a faithful son, was ad- 
mitted into the arcana of celestial character 



30 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

and knew the golden iheart of the designs of 
Jehovah. He saw things f ronu the point of view 
of the Creator, for by Him were all things made 
and without Him was not anything made that 
was miade. He was the beloved Son, in whom 
the Father was well pleased. He alone knew 
the Father and was conscious that no one could 
approach the Fatiher but by Him. God ac- 
corded Hiimi divine recognition and testified of 
Him in the presence of men. He lived daily in 
the "holy of holies," all the while "in tune with 
the Infinite," because He was Himself God. 
He was obedient to the Father's will, because 
responsive obedience is a distinguishing char- 
acteristic of a noble faith; therefore. He has 
been highly exalted and given a name that is 
a;bove every name. 

From the height of this mlarvelous and divine 
consciousness He looked down upon the souls 
of m,en, and penetrating with His all-powerful 
vision their degraded condition of sin and 
death, gave Himself a ransom for many. Thus 
infinite faith found expression in infinite love. 
He surrendered Himlself to become a great sac- 
rifice that H!e mjight reconcile men to the truth. 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 31 

O mlarvelous faith! O matdMesg love! It is not 
to .be wondered at that a redeemed soul, look- 
ing by faith upon Calvary, should exclaim): 

"My faith looks up to Thee, 
Thou Lamb of Calvary, 
Saviour Divine!" 

The sweet story of Jesus' love is the song of 
the ages. Isaac Watts, in inspired strain, sings 
thus of it : 



'*Plunged in a gulf of dark despair, 

We wretched sinners lay. 
Without one cheering beam of hope. 
Or spark of glimmering day. 

With pitying eyes the Prince of Grace 

Beheld our helpless grief; 
He saw, and (O, amazing Love!) 

He ran to our relief. 

Down from the shining heights above 

With joyful haste He fled. 
Entered the grave in mortal flesh 

And dwelt among the dead. 

O for this love let rocks and hills 

Their lasting silence break. 
And all harmonious human tongues 

The Saviour's praises speak. 

Angels, assist our mighty joys. 
Strike all your harps of gold; 

But when you raise your highest notes. 
His love can ne'er be told!" 



32 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

In the contemplation of the exquisite char- 
acter of Jesus we discover the secret of all sym- 
mietry and beauty. In Him are exhibited the 
poise, simplicity and graciousness that distin- 
guish every true Christian man and woman. 
In Him alone is found the beautiful and perfect 
ideal. 

Now, if Christ be in us the hope of glory, we 
become daily m'ore like Him, and, consequently, 
increase in the knowledge of the truth. Our 
faith is enlarged, our hope is brightened, and 
we grow miore sincere in motive, and become 
pure in heart, consistent in conduct and happy 
in the peace that passeth understanding. Thus, 
through obedience to Him, we are rescued from 
the power of sin and death. 

A life thus stirred and steadied by a new 
and noble purpose, supported by a great faith, 
and inspired by Divine love, follow^s the path 
of the just that shines more and more unto the 
perfect day. Walking in this heavenly high- 
way, one adds daily to his power of self-con- 
trol and exhibits to those about him the gra- 
cious spirit of Christian love. His thoughts 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 33 

are pure and sweet, because they are of heaven 
and of God. 

The life of such a one is that of sacrifice and 
denial of self, for he pours himself out to enrich 
the character and experiences of his fellow 
men, even as the mountain wastes itself in 
fertility upon the valleys below. He grows in 
the knowledge of the truth, because he is teach- 
able, having the spirit of the Master, who was 
meek and lowly and did always the Father's 
will. His vision of spiritual things con- 
stantly brig^htens, because he has caught the 
secret of God and waits joyously for the time 
when he sihall receive the crown in the presence 
of the king. 

No longer is he the poor, wretched, selfish, 
sinning soul that he was, limping and halting 
along the journey of life, with no fixed purpose 
and no bright hope ; but the vision of the delect- 
able mountains has burst upon him and hope 
springs grandly in his breast, for he is con- 
scious of a great purpose and has the assur- 
ance of a blessed life. He possesses the ex- 
quisite joy of knowing that his life is elevated 
and ennobled by the experience of the truth, 



34 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

and as a conscious, intelligent personality lie 
feels liiinlself drawn daily more and more into 
barmony with the purposes of the Eternal. 

This enlightening and inspiring conscious- 
ness of vital touch with the divine life issues in 
a radical readjustniient and transformation 
of his character. He is now a ne\(^ creature in 
Christ, and his conceptions of life and life's 
relations and responsibilities are changed ac- 
cordingly. He adopts a new chart and com- 
pass, for he has new purposes and new ideals. 
He occupies an attitude not hitherto charac- 
teristic of him, for he has been transformed 
by the renewing of his mind, and, therefore, 
looks upon life and upon men from a new point 
of view; he regards themi from! a different 
angle. He begins to see some things he never 
saw^ before. He seeks a vision of men from the 
standpoint of Jesus, who looked beneath the 
exterior, and beyond the class and circle and 
caste of w^hiclh a man was a part, auid fixed 
His divine gaze upon him as a needy human 
soul. Distinctions of pedigree and position and 
earthly power have little weight, now; it is 
enough for him to know of a fellow creature 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES 35 

that lie is one for whom Christ died, one who 
needs love and sympathy, one for whom he has 
a message, a miessage of hope. 

Thus 'he comes to see in the Hottentot of the 
wilds or in the black man at his door a fellow 
humian being, calling upon him for kind and 
compassionate recognition. He is stirred by 
the needs of Ihis lowly brother. The proud 
feeling of superiority that formerly character- 
ized him is exchanged for that of kindness and 
Christian condescension. Race prejudice dis- 
appears and brotherly love takes its place. He 
is not unaware that the negro is morally weak, 
commercially and politically to a large degree 
incomjpetent, and socially not a desirable com- 
panion ; but he nevertheless looks upon him as 
a brother and extends to him a helping hand 
and treats him kindly. And thus he feels 
toward all men of low estate, having in him the 
miind that was in Christ. 

His attitude towards men and things in gen- 
eral is changed. The exhortations of Paul in 
the twelfth of Romans take hold upon him 
with their wealth of practical Christian teach- 
ing. Because he has been transformed, and is 



36 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

being daily transformed, lie is kindly af- 
f ctioned towards his brethren and in honor pre- 
fers them above himself. He adopts the true 
Christian philosophy that leads him to return 
good for evil. He has the forgiving spirit, even 
as he hopes for the forgiveness of his H^eavenly 
Father. It is his delight to meditate upon God 
and upon His Holy word, to visit the fatherless 
and the widow, and to keep himself unspotted 
from the world. 

He views the selfish pursuits and enterprises 
of men, perceives that they are a part of an 
order of things that must inevitably end in 
ruin, and keeps himself separate from them. 
He does not boast of his piety and is not 
tainted with conceit over his new experience ; 
he looks with contempt upon no man; but he 
makes it his strong purpose to abstain from 
every form of evil. He is "in the world, but 
not of the world.'' 

The things he once loved now he hates. He 
abhors that which is evil. His soul is sensi- 
tive to the least approach of sin ; vice is hateful 
to him. Impure and unholy thoughts are ban- 
ished from his mind, the field of which he sows 



THE QUEST OF THE AGES Z7 

in good seed, craving a rich harvest of truth 
and love. He is temperate in all things, exer- 
cising especial care over his body as well as his 
soul. Things too often regarded as secondary 
and comimonplace now give him concern, and 
he feels deeply the truth that it is his entire 
life — body and soul — that Christ came to save. 
ITe must present himself icliolly an acceptable 
offering. 

And as thus he continues in the upward path 
of duty, a beatific vision of heavenly things 
fills his soul. He consorts with celestial beings 
who are invisible and w^homi the world is in- 
capacitated to understand or appreciate. He 
enjoys a holy commjunion with a realm far be- 
yond the touch and tinge of earthly gold and 
grandeur, where the lordly principalities of a 
sinless kingdom do the bidding of the divine 
Father and rejoice in the triumph of the 
Church, mingling their voices with those of 
the redeemed and singing : "Holy, Holy, Holy, 
Lord God of Hosts ! Heaven and earth are full 
of thy glory V^ 

Surely a man thus saved and thus redeemed 
has m'ade a successful search for the poles, 



38 THE QUEST OF THE AGES 

having found them in the character and per- 
sonality of the Son of God and having realized 
them in his own experience. Truly now his 
mind may "move in charity, rest in providence, 
and turn upon the poles of truth." His glory 
is not that of one who has penetrated the cold 
regions of the far north, but of him who has 
become an heir of God and a joint heir with 
Jesus Christ. His rew^ard is not the plaudit 
of kings or of empires, but the voice of his 
Heavenly Father saying, "Well done !" 



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